pride devours

i personally think that seeking feedback from others on how we've progressed is good. a good practice, definitely a good thing. it might be a necessity, at times, depending on the situation, different circumstances. we need others to assess us sometimes, to give the check and balance. so that we know that we are doing the right thing.

you see, conscience alone is not enough. we need others in this life. why? because we are not perfect, not even close to perfection, if there's such thing as one. being independent is good, a true characteristic of maturity. but extreme independence becomes negative. we don't want to be too independent like an island, don't we? isolated, disconnected and helpless.

actually, interdependency is an act of another maturity level. way beyond the private victory, against extreme self esteem, pride and self indulgence. i'm not saying that self esteem is not good. we have to maintain a certain level of self believe and confidence. but in this life, the very best thing is balance.

being able to listen and paying attention, observing others are few attributes towards the public victory. the ultimate winning. but listening alone is just inadequate. we need to be opened, unoffensive, not defensive and less complacent, mature enough to accept people's opinion and feedback. listen first and then assess the information. accept, and appreciate the differences. the differences are beautiful. just because we are different, distinguished from each other, it doesn't mean that one of us is wrong. it's just up to us, whether we want to learn from each other or not.

pride and complacency are two lethal unnoticed carcinogenic virus in people. people sit back and embrace themselves due to their ignorance. and those can consume us eventually. if we can't manage these, we are going backwards and nowhere. stagnant and worst, people will loose hope on us, and desert us.

we, human, we are homo sapient not homonus nocturnas. we are not vampires. we are all inherently good people, nice, living by the principles. but ego mismanagement and ignorance ruined it all for us, for centuries. era by era, civilization after civilization. thus, let's pray that we stay on the right course, always. amin.

keeping promises

as promised, 1st of july, the rejuvenation day. i revamped my blog layout. apparently there were slight changes to the initial idea of retrofitting.

the earlier idea was to put teal as my background but unfortunately kinka, it didn't fit with page nicely and the color was too vibrant, overwhelming the rest and made it very difficult to read.

so i changed the main color, matched it with the main "volatile+redundant" header. those two words are best in defining me. in my writing world. hence the new theme.

so, keep on reading or visiting. and seriously i'd appreciate comments. in english, infallibly. my mandarin is not that sharp. mind me :P

drama in johannesburg

finally spain broke their quarter final jinx. once again, 175cm tall david villa is their hero. it was a very very difficult game. but, spain unwilling to trade and give up their tiki taka triangle short passing style of play, continue to press and press. 83 minutes gone before iniesta, pedro and villa broke the dead lock.

whatever it is, i think it is already high time for vicente del bosque, the former glorious real madrid player and manager to start cesc fabregas instead of torres. especially against the hardworking and technically sound german side. pact the middle park to overwhelm bastian schweinesteiger and sami khedira. to suppress the speed of young ozil and podolski.

but the game against paraguay was a howler. full of dramas. two missed penalties. two disallowed goals. two players spilled their blood for their teams. and it was twice against the posts for a goal. the soul goal. it was not that convincing but a win still a win. they worked hard for it.

so spain will meet the germans in durban in four days time. what a game, what a meet, what a rematch of euro 08 final. anyway, deustch, here we come..

beautiful football for a football romantica

barcelona and spain's playmaker xavi hernandez said that football should be attractive and easy on the eye, pleasant for the eyes to see. i totally agree with him. all my life i only know how to play, watch and support that kind of football. at least i tried my best to.

it makes it double satisfying when your team play beautifully and winning. i don't understand and i can't imagine how does it feel to play with all those so called modern efficient football tactics, to play ultra defensively and rely just on counter attacks. for me, winning a football match is to conquer the ball possessions, creating chances and of course, scoring outstanding goals. not scramble in front of the goal post kind of finishing. if you know what i mean.

both previous world cup finalists are out already from the competition. i guess, in the end, teams who play nicely individual and as a team will prevail. let's hope for the best, competitive games and high scoring matches!

breathing onwards

every time i came close, i propelled them away, further back. somehow my sincerity is always misjudged and showering me with misfortunes. i don't know what else to do. fickleness. is surely exhausting me.

sometimes we just have to stop looking back, appreciate what's in front of us, and start looking forward. living in the past won't take us anywhere. enjoy what's present and plan for the future. life in reverse is just stagnant. it's like a twinge into the old scars. rubbing salt onto the exit wound. breathing onwards is dynamic and it is all what we need to achieve what is missing. to purge back air and living into life.

whatever it is, stick to the principles. patience, be grateful, merciful, humility, and bear no ill thoughts. hope things will work out and turn up to be A okay. finger crossed, knees on the ground, palms held upwards and head's down. and i am just one phone call away if you feel like sharing it with me.

anyway, 11 days to rejuvenation day. and counting.

time for change

it is. it is now already june, and i feel like opting for a swing of mood. i need new colors. so, here are my new designs for light at the end of the tunnel version 1.2 which will be commencing next month. kick off at july the first. remind me on that. please. i usually forgot dates :) the new design is elemental by twisted stripes of colors. cheers~

la furia roja

world cup is here haunting us again. once again, being no longer a dark horse, my all time favorite team, spain is tipped as favorites to lift the cup there in south africa. currently they sit in first place in fifa world ranking ahead of brazil and argentina. and there goes the pressure mounting on the players and so do the supporters.

spain, lavished with bunch of talented players to pick from. they have the strongest squad all the way from the goal keeper to the top strikers, some said. they are relatively young with age average of twenty four, an exciting blend between young guns and old horses in the likes of barcelona's pedro and carles puyol respectively. they are technically sound, high work rate, their skills and ability are exemplary and they have been playing together for quite sometimes resulting as perfect gelled teamwork.

with san iker casillas between the goal posts, sergio ramos galloping at the right flank, with xavi hernandez, andres iniesta, david silva and francesc fabregas mastering the middle park, and power forward david villa up front, spain surely looks unstoppable. they have their own style of play, a total possession domination, tiring their opponents with short and neat passing, ready to electrify the atmosphere.

i've been supporting la furia roja or the furious red since i was 11. they had always been disappointed and disappointing in big tournaments, a total big flop, underachiever, it's like they couldn't replicate their club forms in the likes of valencia, barcelona and real madrid, until they finally broke their jinx in last euro 08 in austria, when iker casillas lifted the trophy eliminating all the rumors that there were politics issue in their dressing room saying that the barcelona captain puyol should be the national captain instead of the real madrid keeper since there were only 2 real madrid players in the team i.e casillas and sergio ramos (ruben de la red were still loaned to getafe during that time) compared to barcelona's xavi, pique, iniesta, etc. nevertheless the victory somehow sent a message to the big boys of world football e.g. brazil, argentina, france, italy or england that they were not to be taken lightly again.

but humility is the essence of success in this world cup for the spanish team as said by their sporting director come assistant manager, fernando hierro, former real madrid and spanish captain. they have to maintain their feet on the ground, focus and play like how they want to play their game. i am sure that they have learned from their past mistakes e.g the painful exit in previous world cup back in germany when france destroyed their hopes in the second round and failure to advance from group stage in both euro 04 and world cup 98 when hierro himself and raul were in the team.

whatever it is, just like what kinka said, rain or shine, viva espana! we'll see how their progress to the final, where brazil and italy are the potential opponents in their upcoming knockout stages. llueva o truene, vamos espana siempre!

No.	Pos.	Player	DoB (Age)	Caps	Goals	Club
1	GK	Iker Casillas (c)	20 May 1981 (1981-05-20) (age 29)	104	0	Real Madrid
12	GK	Víctor Valdés	14 January 1982 (1982-01-14) (age 28)	1	0	Barcelona
23	GK	Pepe Reina	31 August 1982 (1982-08-31) (age 27)	20	0	Liverpool
2	DF	Raúl Albiol	4 September 1985 (1985-09-04) (age 24)	23	0	Real Madrid
3	DF	Gerard Piqué	2 February 1987 (1987-02-02) (age 23)	16	4	Barcelona
4	DF	Carlos Marchena	31 July 1979 (1979-07-31) (age 30)	59	2	Valencia
5	DF	Carles Puyol	13 April 1978 (1978-04-13) (age 32)	83	2	Barcelona
11	DF	Joan Capdevila	3 February 1978 (1978-02-03) (age 32)	46	4	Villarreal
15	DF	Sergio Ramos	30 March 1986 (1986-03-30) (age 24)	60	5	Real Madrid
17	DF	Álvaro Arbeloa	17 January 1983 (1983-01-17) (age 27)	15	0	Real Madrid
6	MF	Andrés Iniesta	11 May 1984 (1984-05-11) (age 26)	43	6	Barcelona
8	MF	Xavi Hernández	25 January 1980 (1980-01-25) (age 30)	87	8	Barcelona
10	MF	Cesc Fàbregas	10 May 1987 (1987-05-10) (age 23)	50	6	Arsenal
13	MF	Juan Manuel Mata	28 April 1988 (1988-04-28) (age 22)	8	3	Valencia
14	MF	Xabi Alonso	25 November 1981 (1981-11-25) (age 28)	69	9	Real Madrid
16	MF	Sergio Busquets	16 July 1988 (1988-07-16) (age 21)	13	0	Barcelona
20	MF	Javi Martínez	2 September 1988 (1988-09-02) (age 21)	2	0	Athletic Bilbao
21	MF	David Silva	8 January 1986 (1986-01-08) (age 24)	36	7	Valencia
22	MF	Jesús Navas	February 26, 1985 (1985-02-26) (age 25)	6	1	Sevilla
7	FW	David Villa	3 December 1981 (1981-12-03) (age 28)	58	38	Barcelona
9	FW	Fernando Torres	20 March 1984 (1984-03-20) (age 26)	73	24	Liverpool
18	FW	Pedro Rodríguez	28 July 1987 (1987-07-28) (age 22)	3	1	Barcelona
19	FW	Fernando Llorente	26 February 1985 (1985-02-26) (age 25)	7	3	Athletic Bilbao